


Camp Knightwood

by missbip0lar



Category: Captain America (Movies), Marvel Cinematic Universe, The Avengers (Marvel Movies)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Alternate Universe - Summer Camp, Anal Sex, Bucky Barnes is good with Kids, Drunken Confessions, Explicit Sexual Content, Falling In Love, Flashbacks, Fluff and Smut, How Do I Tag, Late Night Trysts, M/M, Oral Sex, Slow Burn, Sneaky Sex, Steve and Bucky are Camp Counselors, Summer Camp Shenanigans, Tequila Makes Bucky Honest as Fuck, Veteran!Steve
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2014-09-23
Updated: 2014-09-29
Packaged: 2018-02-18 11:09:41
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 8
Words: 14,786
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2346281
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/missbip0lar/pseuds/missbip0lar
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>It feels incredible to be back here; it still looks and smells and sounds exactly the way it did ten years ago, but being back at Camp Knightwood is also a little bittersweet. He knows Bucky’s probably long since moved on from this place, from the friendship and whatever else they’d shared over the course of eight summers but… Steve still can’t help but feel a little nostalgic. Camp Knightwood was where he made his first real friend, where he’d given Bucky Barnes his first real kiss, where he’d tentatively fallen in love for the first time at fourteen years old. </p><p>-or-</p><p>In which Steve Rogers and Bucky Barnes spend eight summers together, and then ten years apart, and then reunite as camp counselors.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Prologue

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Seluvia](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Seluvia/gifts).



> The idea for this fic came to me one evening while I was feeling nostalgic about my summer camp adventures as a kid, and how I'd wanted to be a camp counselor but never really got the chance. I listened to a lot of terrible pop-punk while writing this; Marianas Trench, Hedley, The Cab, Sleeping With Sirens, and old school Fall Out Boy were the main inspirations here, so.
> 
> Updates for this fic will be in sporadic chunks, whenever I'm able to get connected to wifi for a decent amount of time - usually on my days off work. I have about eight chapters written now, and I write every night after work, so I'm hoping to have it completely written... soonish.
> 
> [This](http://notvvithout.tumblr.com) is a link to my tumblr, where I am currently on hiatus, but you are more than welcome to come and send me messages that I'll answer when I'm connected to wifi.

_Summer, 2004_

“So this is our last year here.” Bucky’s kicking pine cones, his back turned away from Steve where he makes use of the tree trunk a yard or two away. It’s the middle of the night, the crickets chirping their damn heads off all around the pair, and there’s a balmy breeze coming out of the trees. “I really can’t believe this is the last time I’ll set foot in these woods.”

He’s trying for nonchalance, but Bucky’s voice wavers on the end there, and even a deaf man would be able to hear the sadness in his tone. Camp Knightwood has been his home away from home for the past eight years and the thought of never being back here, maybe never seeing Steve - the one friend he has always been able to count on here - again… it kind of hurts if he’s honest. 

Steve finishes up, comes to stand beside Bucky in the dark and sighs. “It’s surreal, isn’t it?” he sighs. “High school in the fall, and no more Camp Knightwood. We’re gonna have to stay in touch though. I mean…” he backtracks, “if you want, obviously. I can give you my Instant Messenger screen name and my MySpace if you want.”

“‘Course, Stevie,” Bucky says in return, a sad little smile turning the corners of his mouth up. “I dunno what I’m gonna do with myself next summer. Ain’t gonna have nothin’ to look forward to.”

“I know what you mean,” Steve says with a nod, turning his face up to the moonlit canopy of the woods just behind their cabin, where they should be asleep, but Steve’d had to piss somethin’ fierce, and they’ve always utilized the buddy system here. The light of the full moon barely illuminates Steve’s face, and the shiner from his scuffle with their cabinmate Jeremy earlier today is casting a strange shadow beneath his right eye, but Bucky wouldn’t be able to miss the way the wheels are turning in his head for anything. He _knows_ Stevie, probably as well as he knows himself; they’ve been inseparable for two weeks every summer since their first time here when they were both scrawny little punks getting ready to go into the second grade. 

“‘M gonna miss ya, Buck,” Steve tells him, barely above a whisper, and his jaw is set in some kind of determination, his skinny shoulders rising as he takes a deep breath, and Bucky can see him preparing himself for something big, the way he did the summer they were nine and he decided he was gonna go off the high dive.

Bucky’s just about to ask Steve what he’s planning, but Steve answers the unasked question by taking Bucky’s face in his hands and kissing him. 

It’s not anything monumental - or it _shouldn’t be_ \- just a hesitant, barely there press of Steve’s lips against Bucky’s, but it’s a kiss. It’s not Bucky’s first by any means, but the way Steve’s lips (soft and warm and just a little damp) feel against his own ignites something in him - a warmth that spreads from his belly to his chest and outward to every extremity - that he’s almost afraid to put a name to. Steve, for his part, looks fucking _terrified,_ like he thinks he’s just ruined everything. So Bucky kisses him again, slow and scared, because he’s never kissed a boy before now but somehow it just seems like the next logical step with Steve. Steve pulls back after a few short seconds and stares at Bucky, his lips parted, eyes a little glassy, and his breathing is beginning to get ragged. He pulls his inhaler from the pocket of his sleep pants and takes a few big puffs on it, his eyes never leaving Bucky’s. 

Bucky can’t stop staring either, watching the way Steve’s mouth covers the lip of the inhaler, the way his tiny chest expands when he takes in the medication, and he realizes a little belatedly - after Steve narrows his eyes at him - that he’s got this dopey grin on his face like Steve’s the most precious thing he’s ever seen. And you know, maybe Steve is the most precious thing Bucky’s ever seen; he doesn’t look a day over twelve with his small stature, his blond hair slightly dirty and overgrown from two weeks at camp, but he’s still got more fire in him than Bucky’s ever seen in a single person. He’s stronger than he looks at eighty-two pounds soakin’ wet, and he’s never backed down from anything in all the years Bucky’s known him. Steve’s got the kind of conviction that Bucky’d lop off his left arm for, always stickin’ up for the underdogs (even if said underdog is himself) and tellin’ bullies where they can stick it.

It happened today, when Jeremy started catcalling one of the younger girls at breakfast. Stevie’d called him a pig just loud enough for Jeremy to hear, and it had devolved into a straight up slugfest right there in the mess hall. Bucky’d pulled the bigger kid off his friend after watching him get that one good hit in below Steve’s eye, and their counselor had taken all three boys to the nurse, who’d reprimanded Steve and Bucky to within an inch of their lives. She’d looked at Bucky like it was somehow his fault that Stevie kept gettin’ into fights, but like Bucky’d told her, Steve Rogers has absolutely no self-preservation skills and the skirmishes they’d gotten into in all their summers were mostly because Steve couldn’t keep his yap shut. Mostly.

Steve, of course, had been all “Yes ma’am, no ma’am,” from the second they’d entered the nurse’s cabin, so Bucky’d still been the one to get a slap on the wrist. 

Fuckin’ punk-ass boy scout.

So now here they are, standing in the woods in the wee hours of their last night together, and they’d kissed twice now. What does that make them at this point? Do they go to their respective high schools in the fall saying, “No, I can’t date; I have a boyfriend a few towns over”? It doesn’t seem right, somehow, for Steve to have to go back to Brooklyn and Bucky home to Ithaca.

An owl hoots somewhere off in the distance, and another warm breeze makes its way through the trees, but they’re still staring. Steve’s put his inhaler back in his pocket, and he smiles at Bucky before motioning to their cabin, murmuring, “We should…” and Bucky shakes himself back to reality and agrees. He takes Steve by the hand and leads him up the steps, opening the door and silently padding across the room to their bunks. He climbs the ladder to settle in up top, while Steve flops down below him and gets cozy beneath his blanket.

Leaving in the morning is gonna suck. But Bucky’s determined to keep their long distance friendship alive and kicking.


	2. Reunion

_Memorial Day Weekend, 2014_

Nick Fury is welcoming the new counselors to Camp Knightwood, but somehow he still sounds like he’s barking orders. He’s pacing back and forth, his hands locked behind his back like a drill sergeant, and his sunglasses do a poor job at hiding the scarring around his bad eye, the story behind which Steve remembers hearing like it was yesterday. It feels incredible to be back here; it still looks and smells and sounds exactly the way it did ten years ago, but being back at Camp Knightwood is also a little bittersweet. He knows Bucky’s probably long since moved on from this place, from the friendship and whatever else they’d shared over the course of eight summers but… Steve still can’t help but feel a little nostalgic. Camp Knightwood was where he made his first real friend, where he’d given Bucky Barnes his first real kiss, where he’d tentatively fallen in love for the first time at fourteen years old. 

It’s somewhat funny to think back on it now, their two stolen kisses in the woods that last night and the slightly awkward morning after, when neither of them knew exactly what to say aside from exchanging contact information and halfhearted “See ya”s before parting ways to where their respective parents were parked. There’d been some instant messaging back and forth, a few lighthearted attempts at MySpace interaction, but eventually Bucky’s screen name on Yahoo Messenger became nothing more than a dot and MySpace went under. Steve had tried a few times to find Bucky on Facebook once that became a thing, and he’d succeeded in finding him, but they’d both moved on and done different things with their lives, so Steve never pressed that Friend Request button and simply navigated off-page.

Now, though, it’s like being back here is making his skin tingle with memories and Steve’s not completely sure what to do with all those feelings. How is he going to be able to spend an entire summer here, expecting to be able to look over his shoulder and see Bucky Barnes grinning at him, _without Bucky?_

And that’s when Nick Fury directs their attention to the veteran counselors. Three people come strolling out of the mess hall and Steve’s heart leaps in his chest because _it’s him._ Bucky looks fantastic; he’s grown his hair out, keeps it pulled back in a small ponytail where only a few strands of his bangs frame his face. He’s wearing a black ribbed tank top and he’s got a full sleeve tattoo covering his left arm and hand, some kind of intricate metalwork adorned with a red star on his bicep. Beside him is a petite woman with the reddest hair Steve’s ever seen, wearing a blue Camp Knightwood tee shirt and a pair of faded jeans. And beside her is a man who looks a little older, maybe in his early thrities, with short blond hair and a bored expression.

“This is Bucky, Natasha, and Clint,” Fury says. “Bucky Barnes is head counselor. He has been working here at Camp Knightwood every summer since he graduated high school, and before that he spent every summer here as a camper. Natasha Romanoff is Knightwood _Lake’s_ lifeguard and swim instructor. And Clint Barton is only here because he’s the best archer I know and I pay him to do the only thing he enjoys doing.”

Clint smiles and asks, “Since when do you pay me to eat pizza and watch Netflix?”

Fury ignores him. “You all know your cabin assignments. Get there, get unpacked, and meet back here for dinner and training in an hour.” 

Everyone’s parting ways then, and Bucky is laughing with Natasha, and Steve is suddenly overcome with the desire to talk to him. 

So he approaches him, tries for casual when he says, “Hey, Buck. Long time no see.” Bucky’s gaze settles on him then, confused for a split second before recognition creeps over his features.

“Stevie?!” he asks incredulously, grinning and unashamedly raking his eyes up and down Steve’s body. “I thought you were smaller. What _happened_ to you?”

“I joined the Army,” Steve shrugs. And it’s true. When Steve was a junior in high school he decided he wanted to enlist when he graduated, and his mom had gotten him into some medical study for kids with asthma; whatever they’d given him worked, and he’s been breathing easy for almost ten years now. So at eighteen he’d enlisted, shipped off to basic training and overseas to fight the good fight, pulled a few other guys out of the trenches and snapped his femur in half. He has a metal plate in his leg now, a medal of honor, and an honorable discharge. He tells Bucky all this, a quick summary of what he’s been up to, before shrugging again and saying, “Gotta make money somehow, and I missed this place, so.”

“Goddamn, man!” Bucky smiles, pulling Steve into a hug. “It’s good as fuck to see you! I’ll be honest, I haven’t even realized how much I missed seeing your ugly mug here since my first summer as a counselor. So what’s your cabin assignment?”

“Uh,” Steve says, pulling a piece of paper from his pocket. “Powertown, Cabin four.”

“Elevens and twelves,” Bucky nods. “You’ll have fun. I’m across the way, in Adventuretown with the Littles.”

Steve can feel the surprised look on his face; he hadn’t pegged Bucky as the type to counsel the first timers, the little six and seven year old kids who’ve never spent a week away from home in their entire lives, but he looks excited about it.

“I know, right?” Bucky chuckles. “Who’d have thought I’d be playin’ with the Littles all summer long? It’s the best age group, dude, you don’t even know. I’ve been head counselor here for a few years now and I get first dibs. Adventuretown, Cabin one, every year. I wouldn’t have it any other way. Walk with me?”

So they gather up their duffels and head down the winding path toward their cabin clusters. Walking through Camp Knightwood, even ten years later, is just like getting back on a bike; Steve knows where he’s going, knows instinctively where he’ll find his cabin, knows he’ll be able to open the door and see Bucky’s cabin across the path, and the enormous fire pit and totem pole a few yards away. They help each other unpack, and they catch up. Bucky has a teaching degree, it turns out, but he hasn’t done anything with it yet, choosing instead to try and get his Ph.D. 

“I wanna be an elementary school principal,” Bucky tells him, and Steve smiles because that wasn’t something he ever thought he’d hear come out of Bucky’s mouth. After a short lull in conversation, while they’re both just grinning and staring at each other, Bucky bites his lip and asks, “So, uh, you got a girlfriend or… or anything?”

“Or a boyfriend,” Steve supplies with a smile, “you can say it. But uh, no I don’t. Not right now, anyway. I dated this girl Peggy when I was stationed in London and she was…” Steve huffs out something caught between a laugh and a sigh. “She was somethin’ else. But her home was London and mine was Brooklyn and I had to come home sometime, y’know? We parted on good terms though.”

“I get that,” Bucky nods. “So you’re back in Brooklyn, huh?”

“Sure am. How about you? Still living upstate?”

“Nah, I’ve got a little place near campus,” Bucky says. “Just a little studio apartment, but my financial aid helps pay for it so I can’t complain.”

“Girlfriend?” Steve asks. “Boyfriend?”

“None of the above,” Bucky smirks. “I’ve dated casually, but I dunno,” he shrugs. “I guess I just haven’t found anyone I like enough to have an actual relationship with.”

“It’ll happen,” Steve tells him. “When you least expect it, you’ll find someone.”

It gets quiet after that; not uncomfortably so, and it’s strange the way they can pick up right where they left off _ten fucking years ago,_ with a side of awkward uncertainty. Because, Steve thinks, where do they stand with each other? After that night, they never really talked about it, about what the kiss meant, about how it made Steve feel like the knots in his chest were finally beginning to let up, how - even at fourteen - it had felt like coming home. 

But how is he supposed to say any of that, all these years later, when Bucky looks like something plucked from the classiest porno Steve’s ever watched? When Bucky is so far out of his league that it’s almost sickening?

It’s as they’re finishing up in Steve’s cabin that someone else comes in; he’s about Steve and Bucky’s age and introduces himself as Sam. He’s in cabin three, it turns out, and has “no idea what he’s doing.”

“I’m way outta my depth here,” he says. “My nephew’s seven and this is his first summer at camp. His mom said he might be more comfortable here if there’s someone he knows around.”

Bucky nods. “At that age he’ll be across the path over there in Adventuretown, with me or one of the other Littles counselors. What’s his name? I’ll put his enrollment form in my dibs pile.”

“Kyle,” Sam says. “Kyle Wilson.”

“We’d better get back to the mess hall,” Steve says with a glance to his watch.

Dinner is grilled cheeseburgers and salad, and Steve sits between Bucky and Sam. The three of them go through camper enrollment forms with the other counselors. They’re choosing the first groups of kids for their cabins, reading parent statements about their child’s strengths and weaknesses, the things the kids are looking forward to doing and learning over the two weeks they’ll be there, and Steve is having an absolute blast. He has thirteen in his pile before he has to backtrack.

“Slow down there, killer,” Bucky chuckles around a mouthful of lettuce and ranch dressing. “Ten to a cabin, pal, you’re gonna have to give three of those up.”

So Steve sifts through them again, hands one to Sam, and two to another one of the counselors. He’s pretty confident that he’s got a good first group, a diverse mix of boys with similar interests who’ll be able to learn a thing or two from each other and maybe form some real friendships. _Like Bucky and I did,_ he can’t help but think. On his right, Bucky is engaged in a quiet, intense conversation with the lifeguard, Natasha. She’s sitting with her elbows on the table, cradling a mug of steaming black coffee, nodding at whatever Bucky’s saying to her, and she glances over at Steve, raising a single brow and then looking back at Bucky with a considering look.

“So what gives, Barnes?” she asks suddenly. “I’ve known you for five years now and you’ve never had more than a one night stand. You talk about wanting to _find someone_ and _be with someone_ but you never make any effort past wham, bam, thank you bro.”

Bucky puts a hand up to silence her. “Nat, we’ve talked about this,” he says. “After Brock -”

“ _Please,_ ” she scoffs. “That was before even _I_ met you. You can’t still be hung up on him.”

“Wait,” Steve interjects. “Brock? As in, the bully whose dad ran the barn when we were kids?”

Bucky sighs and turns to look at Steve. “Yeah, that Brock. He took over the barn when his dad died. He was a few years older than us, y’know?” he asks Steve. Steve nods. “Well, when I started here fresh outta high school I kinda… I dunno I was desperate to like, _fall in love_ or whatever, and for some reason I guess I kinda figured that if I was gonna find love it was… it was gonna be here.” Bucky looks down at the table when he says it, avoids Steve’s eyes. “And Brock gave me the attention I was looking for, but he kept saying he wanted to keep it casual. I didn’t know what that meant; guess I thought I could change his mind runnin’ around here like a fuckin’ twink.” he chuckles. “I couldn’t, of course. There was a party around, uh, around the Fourth, lotsa booze flowin’, and I blurted out a really public ‘I love you.’ It was a fucking disaster,” he finishes on a laugh.

“I can imagine,” is all Steve can say. 

“I’m not still hung up on him, though,” Bucky says, looking pointedly at Natasha. “He just hurt me. I dunno if I can go through something like that again.”

“But if _you’re_ looking for a relationship,” Sam cuts in from Steve’s other side, “and _someone else_ is looking for a relationship, what’s the harm in trying?”

“But the thing is,” Bucky says, shaking his head, “I don’t know if a relationship _is_ what I’m looking for. Dating is kinda like dancing, y’know? It’s fun with just about anyone, but to really make it work you need -”

“The right partner,” Steve says.

“Exactly,” Bucky nods.


	3. First Interlude

_July 4, 2000_

Camp Knightwood’s fireworks display is always great, but this year they’re really pulling out all the stops. Steve’s sitting on a log with Bucky, their knobby knees knocking together with each echoing boom in the air.

“Happy birthday, Stevie,” Bucky says as the grand finale starts.

Steve bumps Bucky’s shoulder with his own, says, “Thanks, Buck,” with his eyes turned up to the sky.

When Steve was real little he thought the Fourth of July fireworks were for his birthday; his mom always let him believe it, too. She’d say, _Look, Steve, your fireworks are starting._ And Steve would grin and crawl onto their fire escape beside her so they could watch the colors dance across the sky together. 

Steve misses his mom while he’s here, but he’s glad he has Bucky. Bucky’s funny and kind and gentle, and he’ll fight beside Steve when Steve gets himself into somethin’ he can’t finish, and he’ll stay awake when they’re supposed to be sleeping and swap stories about their families. Bucky’s the first real friend Steve’s ever had besides his Mama, and sometimes Steve wishes he could reach over and hold Bucky’s hand, but that’s not something boys do with other boys so he always stops himself.

What Steve can’t stop, though, are the memories of Bucky’s toothless grins after summer camp is over and they’re all he has to tide him over until next summer. Bucky always seems to lose a tooth or two at camp; last year he’d shown up with one of his two top teeth missing, and by the time they said their goodbyes the other’d fallen out during swim lessons. He’d greeted Steve’s mom for the first time with a roguish smile reserved for the middle aged ladies who worked in the mess hall, and she’d chuckled at his charm, telling him that once that lisp cleared up he’d be “quite the ladies man.”

He is handsome, even Steve’s gotta admit that, and each summer he gets more and more good looking, filling out in all the right places, while Steve remains scrawny and sick-looking. But for some reason Bucky likes him, likes Steve best out of all the kids they encounter at Camp Knightwood, and Steve simply could not be more grateful that he’s spending his first double digits birthday sitting beside his very best friend.


	4. Like the Wind

_June 1, 2014_

Bucky’s up before the sun. The kids are coming today, so he wants to get a swim and a jog in beforehand. He’s walking into Steve’s cabin at sunrise, quiet as can be, just to watch him sleep for all of thirty seconds because _God,_ he’s beautiful, and then he’s flopping down on Stevie’s bed by the guy’s knees and shaking him awake.

“Stevie,” he says. “C’mon, pal, wake up. Come for a run with me. Let’s do a polar dive, Steve. Kids are comin’ today.”

Steve grumbles something, half asleep, that sounds like “Fuck no go away,” but he’s cracking his eyes open in spite of himself. He smiles at Bucky, and it’s a little lopsided and a lot adorable and Bucky’s slammed with a desire to kiss him, but he doesn’t because Steve’s way out of his league and would probably sucker punch him, so instead he just wraps a hand around Steve’s bicep and yanks.

“Outta bed, Cap, let’s go.”

“Don’ call me that,” Steve grouses, burrowing further into his blankets and trying really hard to look as grouchy as possible.

Bucky gets down right next to his ear and whispers, “I have a blowhorn, don’t make me use it.”

Steve sighs, turns just enough to pin Bucky with a half hearted glare, and then stretches his arms over his head. The motion tugs his blanket down to the center of his torso and Bucky has to think of dead kittens to not embarrass himself; Steve is fucking _ripped,_ and he should either never ever ever wear a shirt again, or he should wear a shirt always to save Bucky from having to eat him alive.

“You should probably start wearing a shirt to bed,” Bucky says, pleased that he’s able to keep his voice mostly even. “You’re gonna send these boys into an adolescent gay panic otherwise.”

Steve just scoffs and rolls his eyes, but Bucky can see the pink tint to his cheeks and he’s overcome with a desire to kiss him again.

“C’mon, punk, put some clothes on,” he says. “We’ll go for a run and then jump in the lake.”

“Do the kids still do the polar dive?” Steve asks on a yawn as he throws on a pair of track pants.

“They have the option to, yeah,” Bucky says. “And so do we. Nat’s at the lake at seven am sharp every day. She’ll probably be there today if you get the lead out.”

So they run. They take the long path, up through the woods and into the outdoor chapel before coming down and around to the showers, past the mess hall and over the spillway bridge toward the lake and the nature center. It’s a damn good run, just over two miles, and on the way Bucky points out the things that have changed. He tells Steve about the girl who fell over the railing of the old bridge and almost drowned in the spillway, how if Nat hadn’t been there when it happened she probably would have died.

“She had a nasty concussion,” Bucky pants. “Only time we’ve had to call an ambulance while I’ve been here.”

“Remember that kid who got stung by a bee when we were twelve?” Steve asks.

“Oh, shit! Yeah, I’d forgotten about that,” Bucky laughs. “Poor bastard blew up like a fuckin’ balloon. It’s a good thing Jacqueline had all those EpiPens stocked up.”

“She still the nurse?” Steve wants to know.

“Nah, she retired a few years ago,” Bucky says. “The new nurse is great though. Her name’s Maria. I think she and Fury might be doin’ the horizontal tango.”

Steve wrinkles his nose up and Bucky doesn’t blame him. The thought of Nick Fury in any kind of sexual situation is enough to make just about anyone gag. 

Natasha’s sitting in her lifeguard chair when Bucky and Steve come to a stop on the sand. She has a book open but she doesn’t seem to actually be reading, and she watches the two of them as they strip down to their boxers.

“What a gorgeous morning,” she says with a smirk. “Can’t beat a view like this one.”

“Yeah, eat my ass, Natasha,” Bucky shoots back.

“No thanks, Barnes, you’d like that too much.”

Nat goes back to her book, and Bucky turns to Steve.

“Ready?” he asks. 

“Same deal as when we were kids?” Steve confirms.

Bucky nods. “First one to puss out sacrifices their pancakes.”

“On three.”

They count down together, and a breeze blows past as the pair of them hit the water with a simultaneous yelp. The freezing water never fails to shock Bucky’s nervous system, and it wakes him up like a straight shot of caffeine, Steve is shivering in the shallows a few feet away, droplets of water clinging to his skin, and Bucky forces a laugh past his chattering teeth. Steve’s staring at him, and Bucky’s staring back, and the air between them is all but crackling with some kind of tension. Bucky’s not about to call it sexual tension, unwilling to presume that Steve’s feeling it too.

Steve breaks the moment, though, by scooping up a handful of water and dousing Bucky from head to chest.

“You motherfucker,” he mumbles, chuckling and returning the favor.

It devolves into some kind of childish splashing fight, the two of them chasing each other through the shallow part of the lake, moving deeper and deeper until they’re past the barriers and up to their necks in ice cold water. Steve takes a deep breath, looks at Bucky with a challenge in his eyes, and submerges himself. For a second Bucky has no idea where Steve is, until he feels a strong arm wrap around his knees and take his legs out from under him. It takes Bucky by surprise and knocks him off balance, and he barely has time to hold his breath before he’s going under with Steve. Bucky would laugh if he could, because the tables have turned now from when they were kids, when Bucky would do the same to Steve. Steve would always be spitting mad when he’d finally break the surface of the water, telling Bucky off for surprising him like that. _What if I’d had an asthma attack?!_ he’d shout. But that’s not a problem anymore, it seems, and now they stay beneath the surface of the lake, grappling and trying to keep one another there are long as possible.

They break the surface together, gasping and laughing and pushing each other around, and they’re standing practically chest to chest and Steve’s face is flushed from the exertion of their play fight. That tension in back, sparking between them, and Bucky just can’t stop himself from taking in the way Steve looks; his chest is heaving, his face red and soaking wet, hair in complete disarray, and _goddamn_ Bucky is never going to be able to get used to the way Stevie looks now. He has certainly grown into that big personality of his, and if Bucky didn’t know any better he’d want to accuse Steve of juicing up because the transformation he’s gone through - from looking scrawny and malnourished to _this_ \- it’s not natural. He supposes a few years in the military could do that to a person, but at this point Bucky’s chocked it up to the universe being out to get him. How is he supposed to look at Steve - the kid he kinda-sorta fell in love with at fourteen years old - and see this dude that’s been plucked right out of Bucky’s wet dreams without wanting to jump him?

But, once again, Bucky doesn’t. He just shoves his friend’s shoulder and says, “C’mon, we’d better get some real clothes on before breakfast.”

“Or you could go find a secluded spot and fuck it out,” Natasha suggests from her lifeguard chair. “I can feel the sexual tension from here.”

“Don’t mind her,” Bucky says, trying desperately for casual and failing miserably. “She thinks she’s a matchmaker but really she just makes my friendships weirdly awkward.”

Steve smiles and looks away. “I mean,” he shrugs. “She’s not wrong about the sexual tension. I feel it, I know you feel it. Gonna have to be dealt with at some point.” He wades back into the shallows and out of the water. His boxer briefs are almost completely transparent and Bucky can’t tear his eyes away from the swell of Steve’s ass. “See ya at breakfast, Buck,” Steve says casually, shooting Bucky a look over his shoulder as he bends to gather up his clothes, and then he’s walking back to his cabin, and Bucky’s left gaping at his retreating form.

Natasha’s like a ghost, creeping up silently beside him to watch Steve walk away as well.

“Hate to see him leave…” she says quietly.

“But I can’t really complain about watchin’ him go,” Bucky finishes for her. He comes back to himself enough to be a little pissed at her. So he turns to Nat, asks her, “What in the hell, Natasha?”

“Don’t give me that, Barnes,” Natasha says. “He’s just as hot for you as you are for him. Stop being a wuss and make a move already, or are you gonna wait for him to do it, just like you did ten years ago?”

“What do you…?”

“Don’t even act like that,” she says, effectively cutting him off. But her voice is gentle when she continues. “No excuses this time, Bucky. I know the Brock fiasco screwed you up pretty bad, but Steve’s not like that. You said it yourself: he’s a good guy. And you deserve someone like that. What’s the worst that could happen, huh?”

Bucky sighs. “I’ll see you at breakfast, Nat. Got a big day ahead of me.” And he heads toward his cabin to change out of his wet clothes.

Bucky can tell Natasha anything, really, but he can’t bring himself to put words to what he’s feeling. Doing so would require he admit to himself why he doesn’t ask Steve out or make a real move. It’s not fear of getting hurt - never could be, because he knows that Steve is too great a guy to do to Bucky the same things Brock did. No, Bucky’s hesitance doesn’t have anything to do with him, really. He’s afraid he’s not _enough;_ not interesting enough, not attractive enough or smart enough or funny enough. He’s just… Bucky. He doesn’t have war stories or humorous anecdotes, terrible taste in music and food (by everyone else’s standards, anyway), and he can’t hold his liquor to save his ass. What could Steve _possibly_ see in him past a few good fucks? (Because let’s be real, here, Bucky knows he’s an amazing piece of ass.) 

Honestly, Bucky’s just concerned that they’d go on a few dates, screw around a handful of times, and then Steve would get bored. It would be great for a summer fling, if that’s all Bucky wanted. But he wants something real. Natasha wasn’t exaggerating when she’d called Bucky out at breakfast last weekend; Bucky’s been talking about settling down for a few months now. He wants to find someone to come home to, someone who’ll be there for him while he’s writing his dissertation, someone to kiss him and tell him _I’m proud of you_ when he finally finishes grad school. Bucky wants to find the person he’s going to grow old with. 

And somewhere, deep down, he wants it to be Steve. But he’s not enough for Steve, so why even try?

Breakfast isn’t exactly rushed, but some of the new counselors are just _oozing_ anxiety, and it’s almost enough to make Bucky lose his appetite. Steve steals a sausage link off his plate when he thinks Bucky isn’t looking, so he retaliates by taking Steve’s last pancake without breaking eye contact with him.

“So what’s your night off this week?” Bucky asks around a mouthful of food, more out of need to make conversation than anything else.

“Thursday,” Steve responds. “You?” 

“Not till Saturday. Next week?”

“Wednesday,” Steve says.

“Same here,” Bucky smiles. “Wanna grab dinner or somethin’?”

“Sure. What’s that place the counselors used to go?”

“El Patron,” Bucky grins. “They do half price margaritas for Camp Knightwood counselors.”

“That sounds perfect,” Steve says before drinking down the last of his coffee. “It’s a date then.”

He gets up and takes his plate up to the dirty dishes window, and Bucky watches him chat with the cafeteria workers for a few minutes before turning back to his own plate. Clint’s got an eyebrow raised at him from where he’s seated across from Bucky.

“What?” Bucky demands.

“Nothin’,” Clint says quietly. “Just wondering when you’re going to do something about your little crush.”

“Get bent,” Bucky snaps as he stands to dispose of his own tray, and it comes out a little harsher than intended, but Bucky feels justified so fuck it. Natasha obviously said something to him; it’s no secret that Clint and Natasha have been… whatever it is they consider themselves, for a good number of years now, and Nat tells him everything. She had no right to spread Bucky’s business like that, but…

 _But they’re just trying to help,_ Bucky’s subconscious supplies. _They just want you to be happy. And they know Steve could make you happy._

Sighing, Bucky goes back to the table, mutters an apology to Clint, and gathers himself for the campers’ arrival. He finds Steve sitting on the stoop of Adventuretown 1, and flops himself down beside his friend.

“You look troubled, pal,” Bucky teases, knocking their knees together.

“Kinda anxious,” Steve admits. “What if the kids hate me?”

“How could _anyone_ hate you Stevie?” Bucky smiles. “You’re like… the sun personified. And who doesn’t like the sun?”

“That supposed to be some kinda pickup line, Buck?” Steve asks, and for a second Bucky’s heart plummets, but Steve is grinning at him and Bucky laughs.

“Take it however you want, Rogers,” he says. “I’m just telling the truth.”

“The sun personified, huh?” Steve grins. “I like that. But if I’m the sun, what are you?”

“I dunno, Stevie. I’m just… I’m just Bucky. Nothin’ special about me,” Bucky shrugs.

“I think you’re pretty special,” Steve says, and it fills Bucky with a warmth he’d forgotten he could feel. “Maybe you’re… maybe you’re the wind.”

Bucky wants to laugh, but he has a feeling it’s not meant to be funny. “How so?”

“Because when I saw you again that first day,” Steve says quietly, “it was like breathing again for the first time but… it was also like getting bowled over by something I couldn’t control. Like the wind.”

Bucky’s speechless. There’s so much he _could_ say, so much he _wants_ to say, but all that comes out is, “..Stevie, I -” and his heart is racing, and they’re sitting so much closer than they were two minutes ago, and Steve’s gaze drops down to Bucky’s lips like he’s about to -

“Guys, come on!” Sam’s voice calls from the path that leads to the mess hall, and it snaps Bucky out of whatever trance he’s been in, and Steve awkwardly clears his throat. “Kids are startin’ to get here!”

Steve smiles, and he looks about as uncertain as Bucky feels, and he pats Bucky on the shoulder. “Uh, good talk, Buck. Thanks, man, it really helped. Let’s go meet our kids, huh?”

Bucky might be the wind, but right now he feels he’s had the wind knocked right out of him.


	5. Second Interlude

_July, 1998_

“So,” Bucky says, trying not to smile when the blond boy approaches him. “You again.”

“And you,” Steve says; he doesn’t hide his smile. “What’s your cabin assignment?”

“Swordston, cabin 2. You?”

Steve looks down at a slip of paper in his hand, a grin spreading slowly across his face. “You want top or bottom bunk?”

“Race ya for it?”

“You know I can’t, Buck,” Steve grimaces.

Bucky shrugs. “Guess you get bottom, then, Stevie.”

Steve smiles again, like Bucky’s just made his day. “C’mon punk,” Bucky says. “Want me to carry your bag?”

“I’m not a kid,” Steve scoffs, lifting his duffel over his shoulder.

So they make the short trek to their cabin. Bucky’s chosen the door by the eastern window; they’d done the polar dive most mornings last year and Bucky wants the sun to wake him for it this year too. Steve calls the choice perfect, and Bucky loves that they can pick up right where they’d left off last year; Steve’d remembered him, and that’s all Bucky cared about when he saw Steve lugging his duffel out of the mess hall and kissing his mother goodbye.

They talk about their schools, about how Steve hadn’t liked his teacher this past year all that much because she wouldn’t let him bring his inhaler into class every day like his second grade teacher had.

“She made me leave it in the nurse’s office,” Steve says with a roll of his eyes. “Like I wouldn’t know not to abuse it, ya know?”

“Seriously?” Bucky scoffs. “It’s not like you haven’t been usin’ that thing your entire life or nothin’.”

“Exactly!” Steve exclaims. 

“Well if _I_ was a teacher I wouldn’t be like that,” Bucky says, knocking Steve’s shoulder with his own. “I’d take care of my kids. If ya need an inhaler ya gotta have it with ya.”

“You’d be a good teacher, Buck,” Steve nods, and Bucky swells with pride.

“You think so? ‘Cause I think I might wanna be a teacher someday.”

“Sure thing! You could even be a counselor here when you’re older to have practice.”

“Well I wouldn’t wanna be a counselor unless you were a counselor, too,” Bucky tells him.

“I don’t think they’d want a sick guy bein’ a counselor,” Steve laughs.

“I know you’re sick a lot, pal, but you ain’t _just_ a sick guy,” Bucky says. “You’re lotsa things, y’know? You’re a real good swimmer, and they still got your painting from last year hung up in the crafts cabin.”

“They do?” Steve asks, his whole face lighting up.

“‘Course they do! I was just there before I saw you comin’ outta mess. Wanna go check it out?”

Steve nods, and they’re out the cabin door and making their way towards crafts. Bucky’s real excited to spend two weeks with Stevie again; they’d had a lot of fun last year, swimming and painting and making dreamcatchers and learning different sports (Bucky’d beaten the other volleyball team almost singlehandedly while Steve had cheered him on from the sidelines).

Bucky’s excited to see what they’ll be doing this year, looking forward to doing the polar dive with Steve every morning and going on a trail ride by the end of next week. Hopefully Steve won’t get into any fights this year though - last year they’d both gotten in trouble when some bully named Clark had told Steve he wasn’t nothin but a little pipsqueak, so Stevie’d tried to prove himself and Bucky had had to step in, telling the kid off and gettin’ socked in the jaw for his troubles.

Even if Steve _does_ get into a fight or two this summer, Bucky’ll have his back. Steve’s strength and bravery make Bucky feel strong and brave, too, like he could do anything to protect the little punk he’s tentatively already been referring to as his best friend. 

It’s gonna be a good summer; Bucky can feel it.


	6. Just a Kid From Brooklyn

_June 2014_

Over the next week, Steve sees very little of Bucky outside the mess hall; they both have their own cabin to tend to, their own kids to get to know.

The boys in Steve’s cabin are great. There’s a boy by the name of Lucas who only came to camp because his mom forced him to, and he’d been surly and antisocial the first couple of days, but then one of the other boys had gotten him to open up, and they were quickly becoming friends. Steve hasn’t had to get on any of the boys for picking on anyone, and they seem to like Steve as well.

One of the younger ones, Aiden, is an asthmatic, and Steve’s able to commiserate when one of the other boys calls out, “Hurry up,” while Aiden rolls his eyes and keeps his pace steady. 

Only four of the boys are willing to do the polar dive that first morning, and of them, only Lucas and his buddy Jamal continue for the rest of the week. 

Thursday comes far too soon, and Steve is forced to hand over the reins at breakfast to his CIT replacement, Billy, for the day. Billy’s seventeen, not able to have a cabin of his own yet, so he’s spending his second summer in the Counselors-In-Training program, and the CITs take over on the counselors days off. 

So Steve has an entire twenty-four hours to kill, and he has no idea what to do with himself. For the better part of the morning and early afternoon, he just lounges; kicks back in the CIT dorms with terrible daytime television and a few cans of soda from the stocked refrigerator. When that gets boring he goes on a run, grateful that he’s able to charge his phone in the CIT dormitories so he can pop in his ear buds and listen to music while he runs. He spots Bucky walking with his kids toward the restrooms and Bucky waves as they pass.

It doesn’t take long before Steve decides to swing back around and catch up. Bucky’s counting heads as Steve approaches.

“Hey, Stevie!” Bucky beams, before turning to his group of boys and saying, “Guys, can you say hi to my friend Steve?”

There’s a quiet chorus of hellos in Steve’s direction and Bucky turns back to him.

“So,” he says, “how’s your day off going?”

“Boring,” Steve replies honestly. “I have no idea what to do with myself.”

“We’re getting ready to go down to arts and crafts for a while. Wanna tag along and show these kids what’s up?”

“Yeah, alright,” Steve nods, glad to have something to do.

Bucky’s kids, it turns out, are a trip. There’s one, a small boy with green eyes and a blond mohawk named Markus, who seems to be permanently attached to Bucky’s side. He’s got a raspy voice and he looks at Bucky like the sun shines out of his ass, and Bucky teaches him how to make friendship bracelets while Steve shows a few of the other boys how to make the dreamcatchers.

“You know, Bucky and I made one of these every year we were here,” he tells them, glancing over to where Bucky’s seated a few feet away.

“Have you and Bucky always been friends?” one of the boys asks.

“We sure have,” Bucky grins. “We came here every summer. Same two weeks every year.”

“Starting to think our moms may have had somethin’ to do with that,” Steve says with a smile in Bucky’s direction.

“Probably so,” Bucky shrugs. “There’s no way we would’ve been put in the same cabin every year otherwise.”

“So d’you guys like camp so far?” Steve asks them.

“Yeah,” says Bucky’s shadow, and the other kids all nod an affirmative.

“What’s your favorite part?” Bucky asks.

“Swimming!” one boy calls out.

“I like the nature center,” Markus pipes up. “The bugs are cool.”

“When’d you go to the nature center?” Steve wants to know.

“Yesterday,” Bucky replies. “Marko here found a baby bird that’d fallen out of its nest so we took him to Bruce. We’ll have to go check up on him later, huh, buddy?” Bucky asks, nudging Markus with his elbow, and the boy nods.

One of the other boys, Kaden, is the first to finish his dreamcatcher, and he immediately goes to Bucky to show him.

“Dude that’s awesome!” Bucky exclaims with a smile. “The blue feathers look real cool.”

After that it becomes a competition for Bucky’s praise, and Steve just sits back and watches. Bucky’s in his element here, paying each boy the attention he deserves; some get high fives, others a fist bump, and a couple get their hair ruffled. Bucky’s laugh is contagious, and Steve finds himself chuckling right with him. He’s sure he’s got a dopey look spread across his face when Bucky catches his eye and pulls his bottom lip between his teeth. Steve wants to kiss him, wants to take Bucky’s face in his hands and find out exactly what those full, pink lips taste like, and if they were alone right now he probably would.

After awhile, crafts hour seems to be winding down. “Okay, boys!” Bucky calls out at last. “Almost dinnertime. Let’s get back to the cabin and get cleaned up, huh?”

“Steve, are you coming too?” Kaden wants to know.

“Not today, buddy,” Steve says. “I’ve got a date with an extra large deluxe pizza and movies in the CIT dorms.”

“You eatin’ with Nat and Clint tonight then?” Bucky asks quietly.

“Yeah they offered pizza and movies, so,” he shrugs.

“Have fun,” Bucky says. “And don’t let ‘em talk too much trash about me, alright?”

“Aw, Buck, I’m sure they’ve got nothin’ but good things to say about you.”

“Yeah, _okay,_ ” Bucky scoffs, but it’s good natured and only a little sarcastic. “We’re doin’ campfire stories at sundown if you get sick of those two.”

“I’ll try and stop by,” Steve says, before telling Bucky’s boys goodbye and taking off toward the dormitories to hang out with Natasha and Clint.

Pizza and movies turns out to be pizza, movies, and beer. Steve sticks to a single bottle of Guinness, but eats the entire deluxe to himself. By the time they finish the second movie - some stupid cop comedy that has all three of them rolling with laughter - it’s nearly sunset and Steve’s practically itching to get to the bonfire to be with Bucky.

He must be completely transparent, because Natasha doesn’t even bother swallowing her mouthful of pizza when she tells him, “He’s nuts about you, you know.”

Steve almost chokes on air. “Huh?”

“Barnes,” Clint clarifies. “He’s completely smitten. I haven’t seen him this lovestruck since…”

“Ever,” Nat finishes. “I mean I guess he was totally batshit over Brock, too but…”

“But it wasn’t the same,” Clint says. 

They’ve been like this all evening, finishing each other’s sentences like a married couple; it’s endearing, if not a little weird.

“He wears his heart on his sleeve,” Natasha says quietly. “It’s probably why he can’t stop getting hurt.”

“And why he’s so hesitant to start anything new,” Steve nods.

“Don’t you dare hurt him,” Clint says sternly. “There’s a reason he’s always been convinced that Camp Knightwood is where he’s destined to fall in love, you know.”

“Yeah…” Steve sighs, letting his smile speak for itself. “I came here this year with some kind of… abstract hope that he’d be here, too. We talked about it when we were kids, you know? Coming out here when we turned eighteen, being counselors together. It was just a pipe dream then; I was so sick all the time that I didn’t think I’d ever be well enough to chase after kids all summer.” Steve shakes his head and chuckles. “Part of me didn’t believe he’d actually be here, and then I saw him walk out of the mess hall with you two and it was like… I don’t even know… It was like gettin’ kicked in the gut - knocked the wind right out of me.”

“Do you want to be with him?” Natasha asks.

“I want whatever he’ll give me, Nat,” Steve answers honestly. “Ideally, though, yeah I wanna be with him. I wanna be there when he finishes grad school. Hell, I’ll even look over his dissertation if he wants me to. I wanna make him pancakes for breakfast and rub his feet after a long day. I want to kiss him every morning when he wakes up and every night before he goes to sleep.” Steve huffs out a laugh, slightly embarrassed. “God, I feel pathetic.”

“D’you love him?” Clint wants to know.

“I don’t know yet. I did,” Steve says with a nod. “But I don’t really know the Bucky he is now. Not yet, anyway. I loved him for two weeks every summer for eight years, before I even knew I could be in love with another boy. So, yeah, I’m pretty sure I could fall in love with him again.”

It’s quiet for a moment, and Steve thinks about Bucky’s laugh, how his entire face lights up with it, how he chews on his bottom lip when Steve catches him staring. Yeah, Steve thinks Bucky would be real easy to fall in love with.

“Go on, then,” Natasha says at last, practically shoving Steve off the couch. “Don’t you have a bonfire to crash?”

“You know if you guys want me to leave, all you gotta do is say so,” Steve jokes.

“Get lost,” Clint laughs. 

“Yeah, we’re gonna have kinky sex now,” Nat grins.

So Steve leaves, happy to have an excuse to join Bucky in campfire stories.

Bucky and the boys from his cabin are ecstatic to see Steve, and Kaden scooches over to give Steve the seat right beside Bucky, who has a sleepy Markus curled up against his other side.

They tell stories for what feels like hours, and Steve can’t take his eyes off of Bucky; the fire casts shadows over his sharp features and he’s even more beautiful in this light, talking animatedly about the stars and how they weren’t always there; he tells the kids about how lonely the moon used to get, up in the sky all by herself. Her only friend, he says, was a bird, and birds don’t live forever.

“So when the bird realized she was aging, becoming too old to fly to the moon each night and keep her company, she offered to make some new friends for the moon,” he says, and the boys are hanging on Bucky’s every word. “The moon was sad, because she knew she would lose her only friend soon, but she accepted the bird’s offer. So one night, while the moon hung in the sky and the blanket of night fell, the bird took one last flight. She flew higher even than the moon, flew right through the night sky and poked millions of holes in it, so the sun could shine through. Just a little, though. Just enough to create hundreds of millions of twinkling stars to keep her best friend company after she was gone.”

By the time the story is done, most of the boys have fallen asleep. Markus and Kaden and two others are still hanging on, though, and Markus begs Bucky for one last story before they put the fire out and go to bed.

“What kind of story?” Bucky asks.

“A superhero story,” Markus requests around a yawn.

Bucky’s a quick thinker, offers up, “You guys know Stevie’s a superhero, right?”

“No way!” one of the other boys gasps. “Really?”

“He sure is. Steve, can I tell ‘em?” he asks with a wink.

Steve makes a show of considering it, before finally nodding and saying, “If you want, Buck. I don’t think it’s that great of a story. I’m nothin’ special - just a kid from Brooklyn.”

“That’s what he said to his arch-nemesis, too, y’know,” Bucky tells the boys conspiratorily. “He just says it to throw people off - he really is a superhero.”

So Bucky regales his boys with a fantastical story where Steve grew up sickly (not an exaggeration), and then a scientist gave him a super serum to turn him into a super soldier, with super strength and super speed, because the country needed a real hero who’d stand up to the bullies, who’d stick up for the underdog and protect the little guys at all costs. According to Bucky, there was no better choice than Steve.

“He’s always been so _good._ He’s got this fire in him that no one can match. Even as a little kid he was standin’ up to all the bullies, even got himself knocked out a few times as a kid ‘cause he didn’t know how to keep his trap shut, huh, Stevie?” Bucky teases, and Steve nods. “The scientist told Steve, ‘All your good qualities will be amplified; you’ll be faster and stronger, and a weak man who knows the value of power, who knows compassion, is much better suited for this serum than a strong man who will take advantage of the new power he’s been given. We have all these big guys - these bullies - fighting in our wars,’ the scientist told him. ‘So maybe what we need now is a little guy. But Steven, whatever you do,’ he’d told him, ‘stay just the way you are: a good man.’ 

“They call him Captain America and he’s completely indestructible,” Bucky continues. “He doesn’t use guns or lazer beams or any of that fancy stuff. All he needs is his trusty shield and an off-the-cuff speech about freedom, and his enemies are cowering in fear.” Steve can feel himself blushing, grinning at Bucky while the boys look on in awe. “His arch-nemesis was The Red Skull, a scientist who worked for the enemy to try and copy the serum the scientist used on Stevie here. He had alien technology, and he still couldn’t get it completely right. He tried and tried and tried, but the best he could do was give himself the super strength and bright red skin all over his body. He was mad at Captain America because he had everything The Red Skull wanted: respect and power and thousands of friends who’d take a bullet for him of they had to. So at the end of their last fight, when the good guys are dragging The Red Skull off to jail he asks Captain America, ‘What’s so special about _you?_ Why would Dr. Erskine give _you_ the serum and not _me?_ ’ So you know what Stevie said to him?”

“I said, ‘Nothin’ special about me; I’m just a kid from Brooklyn,’” Steve says.

“And then he punched The Red Skull in his ugly red face, one last time,” Markus finishes.

Bucky’s beaming at Steve, who realizes a little belatedly that somewhere in the middle of that story, his own hand had somehow creeped over to cover Bucky’s, their fingers subtly laced together in the shadows. He should be embarrassed, but instead he feels like he could fly, like he could channel his inner superhero and be all those things Bucky thinks he can.

With that, campfire stories are done, and Bucky gets his boys inside the cabin to get dressed for bed, and then comes back out to say goodnight to Steve.

“Well that was…” Steve smiles. “You’re so great with them.”

“Yeah, thanks, I have a good time,” Bucky says, smiling a little self-consciously. “We still on for next week?”

“Absolutely.”

“Good. I’ll see ya at breakfast tomorrow,” Bucky says, leaning in and kissing Steve right on the corner of the mouth.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So yes I may have simplified the Captain America story for the sake of the little kids. Sorry about that.


	7. Third Interlude

_July 2003_

When they’re thirteen, Steve discovers he is good at fencing. Like, _really_ good. He’s quick and smart, light on his feet and always two steps ahead of his opponent. He is the smallest in their year by far, and the fencing instructor says that might have something to do with his proficiency, that he is lucky to be the size that he is.

And for once, Steve _feels_ lucky; feels for once that he hasn’t been dealt the shitty hand, that he can _finally_ excel at something physical.

Bucky, on the other hand, is _terrible;_ quick and smart though he is, he’s put on some weight over the past year and his center of gravity has shifted, throwing off his balance when he thrusts the needle at his opponent. Steve hears him curse each time, hears the frustration in his voice because there isn’t anything that Bucky’s not good at, but this year, it seems, they’ve found something.

After the lesson is over, Bucky congratulates Steve on a job well done, but Steve doesn’t miss the bitterness and resentment in his tone when he says it.

“I could help you,” Steve offers.

And Bucky scoffs at him, bites out, “And why would I wanna be coached by a little pipsqueak like you?”

Any other time, if it were any other person, Steve would fight back. But deep down, Steve always knew his friendship with Bucky was too good to be true. It’s a damn shame that it had to be Steve excelling at something that tore them apart, but it figures. Steve’s had too good a thing going on for too many years now, and with his body falling apart all around him it was stupid of Steve to think he could have even one good thing here - or anywhere for that matter. Steve was stupid to get comfortable around Bucky, stupid to trust him, stupid to think they could be friends, because when all is said and done everyone sees Steve as one of two things: someone to protect, or someone to beat up.

Bucky’d seen Steve as someone to protect, but now that Steve is doing well at something on his own, without needing help from anyone, Bucky’s done with him.

Just like everyone else Steve’s ever let himself get close to. Go figure.

It takes Steve a single night of self pity; he sleeps on it, decides that Bucky was having a rough day, that he wasn’t used to not being good at something. But he’ll be back, Steve figures. Bucky’s not the kind of guy that would throw away an entire friendship over a fencing match.

But Bucky doesn’t speak to him for days, filling his free time instead with some of the other boys in the cabin; Mark, who’s blond-haired and fair-complected like Steve, but he is taller and stronger and more the type of boy Bucky _should_ be spending his time with. There’s also Andrew, a quiet and studious boy who is much like Steve in temperament, and Bucky dotes him the way he used to do with Steve. It hurts Steve a little to see.

And Steve himself does merely watch from afar, taking time each day they’re not speaking to commit Bucky’s smile to memory, to the blank pages of his sketchbook. He pines for the way it was, for their friendship to go back to before, but Steve will give Bucky the space he clearly needs, and it isn’t as though Steve hasn’t caught Bucky staring as well over the past few days. He’s seen Bucky watching him in the mess hall, while they eat the breakfast and their dinner at opposite ends of the table. Bucky watches Steve as they pass one another on their way to the showers, the both of them feeling awkward - not speaking, in nothing except their towels - but still they say nothing to one another.

It’s on the fourth day of their self-induced separation that Bucky finally seems to snap. When Mark and Andrew ask him to hang out after supper, he declines. Steve overhears him telling them he just wants to be alone for awhile. So Steve takes his usual seat at the picnic table they both used to inhabit each evening after supper, and he draws. He’s been doing it a lot lately, since he doesn’t have the constant companionship of Bucky at his side right now, and all his drawings look the same: dark hair, light eyes, and a charmingly off-kilter smile that really only Bucky Barnes could pull off.

Tony, their arrogant, self-righteous douche of a counselor, pulls up a seat of grass beside Bucky, and the two of them talk for nearly twenty minutes. Steve can feel two pairs of eyes on him all the while; they’re talking about him and Steve can feel it. Afterwards, though, Tony claps Bucky on the shoulder and walks away toward Steve, muttering under his breath about how dealing with hormonal boys wasn’t in his job description. Steve wants to look toward Bucky, beckon him over, but before he can Bucky’s taking the seat across from him and trying to apologize. Steve stops him, though, to tell him that he understands. Because he does; he gets the need to be separate for a little while, but they have to go back to being a separate entity at the end of their two weeks together anyway, so why not make the most of those two weeks while they’re available to them?

Steve doesn’t voice any of this, but he feels like Bucky gets it, gets him. And really there’s nothing more Steve could ask for.


	8. Date Night

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Let's earn that explicit rating now, yeah?

_June 2014 - Date Night_

By Wednesday morning, Bucky’s so antsy to go out with Steve he thinks he may actually be losing his mind. After handing the boys over to his CIT replacement at breakfast, he practically flies back to his cabin to change his clothes. He barely even has his jeans buttoned, hasn’t even located a shirt, when Steve bursts through the door. 

“Morning,” Bucky says. “Lemme just find a shirt and we can take off, okay?”

“What’s on the agenda today, Buck?”

“I dunno yet,” Bucky shrugs. “Figure we got a whole day to kill before dinner. Wanna do Coney Island?”

“Nah,” Steve says. “Last time I went to Coney Island I barfed on the Cyclone. Not exactly eager for a repeat performance, you know?”

Bucky laughs. “We could always hang out in the CIT dorms for awhile,” he suggests. “Nat leaves her door unlocked for me on my days off and we could eat all her ice cream and veg out with some movies till dinner.”

“That sounds perfect,” Steve says, crowding into Bucky’s personal space in a way that’s way more than what could be considered platonic. 

“ _Or,_ ” Bucky says, “we could just say to hell with the movies and fool around all day instead.”

Steve’s voice drops an entire octave when he says, “Now we’re talkin’.”

They run all the way to Natasha’s dorm, and Bucky’s giddy with the thought of finally getting Steve naked, _finally_ getting Steve to take him apart like he’s been fantasizing about for - _god,_ for forever.

Steve’s on him the second they get the door closed, pressing Bucky against the door and claiming his mouth in a bruising kiss. There’s no finesse to it; the kiss is sloppy and wet and full of ten years’ worth of pent-up desperation for one another. Steve’s sucking Bucky’s tongue into his mouth, growling, “Fucking _finally,_ ” between kisses, and Bucky’s responding in kind; nipping at Steve’s bottom lip and tugging his hair and moving down to mouth at the long column of throat being offered to him. He’s drunk on it, intoxicated by the taste of Steve’s mouth and skin and the desperate little sounds working their way pasts Steve’s lips.

“More,” Steve grunts, tugging at the hem of Bucky’s shirt to get him out of it, and Bucky sheds it like it’s offended him before moving to strip Steve of his shirt, too.

And then they’re skin to skin, and the smell of Steve, the feel of their chests pushing and sliding against each other makes Bucky moan low in his throat. Steve’s thigh slides between Bucky’s leg, presses hard against where Bucky’s standing erect in his jeans, and it pulls an embarrassing whine from him. Steve’s cock is hard against Bucky’s hip, and they’re rutting against each other like a couple of horny teenagers in the back seat of a car. Bucky, unwilling to come in his pants already, shoves Steve backward toward the couch, and they collapse onto the leather cushions together. Bucky doesn’t break the kiss as he throws one leg over Steve’s lap and straddles him. He’s got his hands tangled in Steve’s hair, and Steve’s fingernails are raking bright red marks into his back and ribs.

Bucky grinds down into Steve’s lap to rub their cocks together, and Steve throws his head back to groan, and then Steve’s hastily pushing Bucky off him and shouting, “ _Jesus Christ!_ ” like he’s just seen a ghost.

And that’s when Bucky notices Natasha, seated silently in the recliner on the other side of the room, casually eating yogurt and watching Steve and Bucky make fools of themselves.

“Well don’t stop on my account,” she says. “This is better than my telenovelas!”

“What the _fuck,_ Natasha?!” Bucky bellows. “Were you just gonna _sit there and watch?_ ”

“Probably,” Nat shrugs. “May have even taken pictures. Or video. It _was_ starting to get pretty hot.”

“Why am I friends with you?” Bucky groans, his hard on all but shriveled with humiliation.

“Because I didn’t kick you out of my dorm when you came barging in here moaning like a cat in heat,” Natasha says evenly.

Steve’s blushing to the tips of his ears, hiding his face in his hands and the mood has officially been ruined.

So once Natasha leaves for the day, it’s back to pigging out on ice cream and gorging themselves on terrible movies all day. Bucky eats the entire pint of Ben and Jerry’s Phish Food that Nat has hidden in the back of the freezer, not completely out of spite, and they do more talking than watching. Natasha has a pretty stellar collection of kung fu movies, so Steve turns off the subtitles and mutes the television, and they spend three entire films making up cheesy dialogue and laughing nearly until they wet themselves. 

They make out a little more, fully clothed, with Bucky on his back on the couch and Steve kneeling between his legs. Steve thrusts against him, gives Bucky a taste of how it could be when they’re finally able to be properly alone for a few hours, and it reduces Bucky to nothing more than a puddle of desperate want. He meets each of Steve’s thrusts with a roll of his own hips, bringing their erections together over and over again until Steve’s whimpering into his mouth and trembling head to toe in his need.

“She’ll be gone till dinner,” Bucky says, trying to coax Steve into letting him get them naked. “C’mon, Stevie, lemme just suck you off. _Please,_ ” he moans, the friction getting to be overwhelming. “Please, I wanna know what you taste like.”

Steve’s got Bucky’s arms pinned above his head, because Bucky’d started to get a little handsy earlier trying to get his hand into Steve’s jeans to jerk him off. This slow burn is too much for Bucky to handle; he wants to just get down to brass tacks, get their pants off so Steve can lick him open, so Bucky can take that thick cock into his mouth and slick Stevie up so Steve can finally get inside him, pound him until all he knows is SteveSteve _Steve._

It’s only when Steve sinks his teeth into the meat of Bucky shoulder and groans, “ _God, Buck, quit talking,_ ” that Bucky realizes he’s said all that out loud.

Steve stops for a moment, pulls back enough to look at Bucky, and Bucky gets a good look at him, too. Steve’s fucking _beautiful_ like this; hair sticking up in every direction, pupils blown wide, lips pink and wet from kissing, his brow drawn tight like he’s trying too hard to concentrate on not blowing his load. He’s fucking _radiant,_ like the fucking sun.

“Christ, Buck, you should see yourself,” Steve breathes. “So fuckin’ gorgeous like this, Bucky. Can’t take it anymore.”

And then Steve’s popping the button of Bucky’s jeans, dragging them and his boxers down over his hips, and Bucky’s heart is pounding with the anticipation of it all; he’s waiting as patiently as he can but Steve’s just fucking _staring_ at his dick and it’s taking every ounce of self control Bucky has to not just grab Steve’s hair and shove himself down the back of Steve’s throat. Steve teases him, not taking his eyes off Bucky’s as he draws the flat of his tongue slowly up the hard flesh of Bucky’s cock, dips the wet point of his tongue under the foreskin. Bucky’s thighs are fucking shaking, and he’s not going to last if Steve tortures him anymore.

“ _Please,_ Stevie,” he pants, and Steve finally - _finally_ \- takes mercy on him, pushes the foreskin back and wraps his lips around the head of him before sucking him down to the root. “ _Ah, fuckyesssss._ ”

It takes Bucky an embarrassingly short amount of time to come apart under Steve’s mouth, and he’s shooting thick and hot down the back of Steve’s throat before Steve even has time to really get going. Bucky’s only half aware of his litany of apologies while Steve moans around him and swallows him down. Steve sucks him through the aftershocks, and Bucky’s whimpering, his oversensitized cock softening in Steve’s mouth even as it twitches its interest in the continued proceedings.

“You taste incredible.” Steve’s voice sounds like it’s been dragged through gravel as he crawls back up Bucky’s body to claim his mouth in another searing kiss, and Bucky’s hands are like jelly while he tries to unfasten Steve’s pants and return the favor. “Take your hair down,” Steve requests, and Bucky pulls the elastic from his hair as he slides to the floor between Steve’s legs.

Bucky doesn’t fuck around, guides Steve’s hands to his hair while he pulls Steve’s cock out of his jeans. He wants to take a few minutes to just look, but needy as he is to get Steve in his mouth, he just can’t bring himself to. Steve bites out a curse when Bucky seals his lips around the thick head, thrusts himself deeper into Bucky’s mouth, and Bucky opens his throat to take Steve as far back as possible but _damn,_ Stevie is huge to the point of being obscene. So Bucky uses his tongue, flicks it across the sensitive bundle of nerves just below the swollen head, and it pulls a moan from Steve.

“God, Bucky, that’s… fuck.” With his mouth unoccupied, Steve’s free to just _talk,_ and Bucky finds himself growing hard again with every word he says. “Been dreamin’ about this for ten years, I swear to God. I always knew you’d be good at this, Buck, with those fucking lips. They were made for it, made to stretch around my dick so nice, _Jesus._ Goddamn, Bucky, you should fucking see yourself right now. Can I thrust? _Please,_ Buck, can I fuck your face?”

Bucky whimpers, tries to nod, and Steve’s hands tighten in Bucky’s hair and he’s lifting his hips, driving himself deeper and deeper into Bucky’s throat. Bucky chokes once, but doesn’t let Steve pull back, just takes him all the way down again and sucks hard. Bucky rolls Steve’s balls in his hand, finds the hard nub just behind and presses there - hard - with his thumb. It makes Steve cry out, and then he’s coming in a whitehot rush into Bucky’s mouth. Bucky swallows as much as he can, his lips and chin slick with the excess as Steve pulls him off his cock by the hair, dragging him back onto the couch to kiss him and lick his lips clean.

“Jesus Christ, Bucky, that was… fuck, baby, _god,_ you’re so perfect,” Steve whispers, running his fingers through Bucky’s hair and showering his neck and jaw and ear with kisses. 

Bucky feels like he could sleep for thirty years and not give a single fuck, completely sated and comfortable in Steve’s arms. Their pants are still hanging around their knees, and despite the fact that it’s getting awfully close to time for Natasha to come home for dinner, neither of them bother to move from where they are to rearrange their clothes. They just kiss, slow and lazy, the desperation from before having dissipated in the wake of their orgasms.

“You’re amazing,” Bucky murmurs against Steve’s lips, pulling his fingers through Steve’s hair and resting their foreheads together. “What’d I do to deserve you?”

“I could ask you the same thing,” Steve says, stealing another kiss before pulling his pants up and giving Bucky room to do the same. 

When they’re fully clothed again, Bucky pulls Steve down on top of him, and they’re lying like that, kissing and smiling and probably looking like a couple of saps when Natasha and Clint make a whole hell of a lot of noise unlocking the door. 

“It smells like sex in here!” Clint announces once the door’s open, and Bucky grins, waving at them from where Steve has him pinned to the couch.

“I hope like hell there aren’t any stains on my couch,” Natasha says.

“It’s fucking leather!” Bucky scoffs. “But no, no stains.”

“Promise?” Nat asks with a raised eyebrow.

“Scouts honor,” Steve replies, maneuvering himself into a sitting position so they can get ready to leave.

“Thanks for letting us hang out in your dorm today, Nat,” Bucky smiles, stretching and getting up from the couch, “but we’re headed to El Patron for dinner and margaritas.”

“Oooh, a first date,” Clint teases in a sing-song kind of voice.

“Yeah, Clint, a first date,” Bucky smirks.

“And you’ve already slept together,” Natasha says with a mock-scandalous gasp.

“Nothin’ wrong with a pre-date blowie,” Bucky shrugs, and Steve’s face turns bright red.

So they says their goodbyes and head out, Steve trailing just behind Bucky as they make their way to the back parking lot. Bucky’s got a little silver Jetta he bought second hand at a good price; it gets good gas mileage and comes equipped with an AV port so he can hook up his iPod, so despite the fact that it’s not exactly a Lexus, Bucky really can’t see any reason to complain. They both buckle in, and before turning the car on Bucky turns to Steve.

“This is usually the part where I warn people,” Bucky says with a small smile, “I have really terrible taste in music. _But,_ you’re just gonna have to deal because this is my car and driver picks the music, so.” He shrugs.

“Who told you that you have terrible taste in music?” Steve asks.

“Just about everyone. Nat, mostly. Y’know how everyone went through a shitty pop-punk phase in middle school or high school?” Bucky asks.

“Yeah, of course,” Steve grins.

“Well I didn’t exactly grow out of it.”

And with that Bucky starts the car, his iPod coming to life with amateur guitar riffs. “The bands we listened to in high school don’t really make music anymore,” he says over the radio. “I mean, Fall Out Boy and Panic! at the Disco are still releasing albums, which is fucking _awesome,_ but generally speaking I’ve had to find all new terrible pop-punk to listen to. And when I’m not in the mood for that I have a bunch of indie crap that not many people have heard of.”

“So you’re a hipster,” Steve jokes.

“Ugh, god, no. Please don’t call me a hipster.”

“That sounds exactly like something a hipster would say.”

Bucky laughs, tells Steve to fuck right off, and puts the car in gear. The restaurant isn’t very far from camp, but Bucky takes the long way around, giving him more time to drive with all his windows rolled down, singing at the top of his lungs while Steve watches him from the passenger seat, and _fuck_ if it’s not the most perfect summer evening. Bucky could get used to this, driving through the New England countryside with Steve at his side, singing along to his favorite songs and apparently not being judged for it. Music has always been one of the loves of Bucky’s life, and knowing what the majority of his friends think of his music choices, admittedly, hurts a little. But seeing Steve smile, hearing him actually sing along to some of the older tracks they’d kind of grown up with, feels incredible. 

Here and there, Steve’ll ask, “Who is this?” and Bucky’ll tell him, shouting over the volume of the stereo. Steve seems to like All Time Low a lot, and he outright tells Bucky, “These guys are really good,” during more than one Hedley track. Bucky’s damn near giddy.

They get to El Patron sooner than Bucky would have liked, and he kills the ignition. 

“Your taste in music isn’t terrible,” Steve says without preamble. “It’s… not what I’d expect from you, but definitely not terrible.”

“Glad someone approves,” Bucky says in return as he gets out of the car.

The waiters here know Bucky, even greet him by name and ask him where Natasha is. “Back at camp,” he tells them. “Can’t exactly bring a meddling best friend on a first date, ya know?” 

That gets them a secluded booth near the back of the restaurant, where no one but their waiter will disturb them, and Bucky orders a shot of tequila and a frozen margarita for each of them. When the basket of tortilla chips and bowl of salsa are placed on the table, Steve salts the salsa without having to be asked, like he knows Bucky’s ritual, and Bucky falls in love that much more. For awhile they eat chips and sip on their drinks and talk, not even looking at their menus at all, and when the waiter comes back for their dinner order they both know exactly what they want, their menus still sitting untouched at the edge of the table between them. 

“Chimichangas,” Bucky says. “Both chicken, extra sour cream on the side.”

And Steve orders the steak enchiladas with an extra side of guacamole.

“One check or two, _amigos?_ ” Asks the waiter.

“One,” Bucky and Steve say in unison, and Bucky can already tell this is going to wind up being an argument over who’s going to pay.

The waiter begins to walk away, but Steve stops him. “Can we get a side of queso dip, too, please?”

Once the waiter leaves, Bucky turns narrowed eyes on his date. “You do realize I’m paying right?”

“Not happening, Buck,” Steve says, leaving no room for argument.

“I seem to recall being the one to ask _you_ out,” Bucky argues anyway.

“True, but -”

“No buts. I asked you out, I pick up the bill, that’s how it works.”

Steve makes a considering noise, says, “We’ll see,” and there’s a second round of margaritas being placed on the table.

“I may have to make you drive us back,” Bucky admits, puckering at the strength of the drink. “Can’t hold my liquor to save my life.”

“That’s fine,” Steve says around a mouthful of tortilla chip doused in cheese dip. “I did a lot of drinking with my unit when I was overseas; I can drive a tank while I’m… well, tanked.”

Bucky laughs, then asks seriously, “So is it a sore subject? The Army stuff?”

“Not really,” Steve says casually. “Not like it is for a lot of other guys.”

“So, uh, where were you stationed?” Bucky asks.

“I did two tours in Afghanistan and one in Iraq. But mostly I was working with some of the Special Ops forces in London,” Steve tells him. “Iraq was my last tour, where I broke my leg in the trenches.”

“Special Ops, huh? Were you like a spy or somethin’?”

“No way,” Steve chuckles. “Espionage isn’t my forte. Advanced hand to hand combat training. I know a hundred and thirty different ways to kill you with just my pinky. If I wanted to.”

Bucky’s not about to admit it out loud, but the very idea has his heart racing with desire. “A hundred and thirty ways to kill me with your pinky, huh?”

“Nah, that’s a bit of an exaggeration. Maybe more like fifty,” Steve admits with a grin.

“So if you’re so skilled, why be a camp counselor?” Bucky wants to know.

“Because breaking my leg as badly as I did kind of limited my job prospects,” Steve says simply. “I was considering opening up a martial arts studio or something, teaching people some of the things I learned.”

“Well, I think that’d be pretty fuckin’ sweet,” Bucky says. “We’ve got a bunch of people on campus looking for a good self-defense class. You could make some pretty killer money.”

“Ah, it’s not even about the money,” Steve says with a wave of his hand as their meals are carried over. “I just want to help people learn to take care of themselves. There’s no one out there who wouldn’t benefit from a self-defense class, you know?”

“So do it!” Bucky urges. “Just think, Stevie; if _you’d_ taken a self-defense class when you were a kid, maybe you wouldn’t have needed me to save your scrawny ass.”

“But if I hadn’t needed you to save me,” Steve counters, “how would I have met you and found out how great you are?”

Bucky scoffs, rolls his eyes, feels his face heat up. “Eat your fuckin’ steak, punk.”

So they eat, and they keep drinking frozen drink after frozen drink, and Bucky is getting well and truly sloshed. The world tilts when he walks across the restaurant after his fifth beverage to break the proverbial seal, and he has to rest his forehead against the cold tile wall in the bathroom while he utilizes the urinal.

“Shit,” he mutters to himself. He hasn’t been this drunk in a long time, since… the memory escapes him - something about a party and a humiliating declaration to someone all wrong for him. Luckily he’s not feeling sick. Bucky feels compelled to knock on something wooden at the thought.

You never realize how drunk you are until those precious few moments alone in the restroom, and Bucky Barnes is fucking _hammered._ He tries to keep himself walking upright on his way back to the booth - the secluded one, he reminds himself, in the back so he and Steve could, conceivably, make out in private. 

There’s a mound of… something, some kind of desert, sitting in the center of the table when Bucky gets back, and Steve tells him to grab a spoon, that he’d ordered them fried ice cream. There’s also a refill on his margarita, and Bucky’s grateful for them both. He drinks deeply, and enjoys the sweet creaminess of the vanilla ice cream, coupled with crisp carmelized… something, whatever the ice cream is rolled in. He inspects a scoop of the stuff where it’s perched on his spoon.

“‘S that… fuckin’ Frosted Flakes…?” he asks, only half sure it’s coming out coherently.

Steve chuckles. “Frosted Flakes,” he confirms, and then, “How ya feelin’, Buck?”

“Fuckin’ ph’nomenal,” he slurs. “Feel like I could lookitchu all the time forever and definitely be okay with it. God sorry tequila just…” he laughs, not sure what to say. “Tequila makes me… honest? _More_ honest than usual? I dunno. I’d kinda like to get outta here soon, though.”

“Don’ apologize,” Steve says, a goofy smile splitting his face in two. “Like ya this honest. Like ya just… in general. I like ya a lot, Buck.”

“Yer feelin’ it too,” Bucky accuses with a drunken, lopsided grin.

“Maybe just a little bit.”

“You sure you c’n drive?”

“Yeah no problem,” Steve says with a wave of his hand. “Done this plenty of times. And I’m not nearly as drunk as you are.”

“Lemme just finish these chips up,” Bucky says, “and then I’ll pay and we can go.”

Steve grins at him. “But I already paid. You can take care of the tip if you want.”

“You and I are gonna fuckin’ fight one of these days. Steve,” Bucky warns, scooping up the last of the salsa with a half a chip.

Bucky pulls a ten and a five from his wallet, leaves it on the table for their waiter, and then lets Steve help him out of the booth. 

They’ve got all the windows rolled down in the car again, and Steve is behind the wheel while Bucky fiddles with his iPod to find something that’ll fit his mood. Steve laughs when Bucky settles on Beyonce, and surprises Bucky when he raps with Jay-Z during _Drunk In Love._ They’re laughing and Bucky’s giving in to his compulsion to kiss Steve’s neck, and Steve’s groaning and swerving just a little and it feels _dangerous._ Bucky’s blood is simmering just below the surface of his skin, his voice coming out in a low growl when he nips at Steve’s earlobe and says, “Stay with me tonight.”

So they stay in Bucky’s assigned dorm for the night, in the spare bedroom so his poor CIT replacement won’t have to wash the sheets. By the time they’re beneath the covers Bucky is begging. They’re stripped down to their boxers, and Steve’s settled between Bucky’s spread legs in the bed, and Bucky is pleading with his body and his words for Steve to get the rest of their clothes off.

“Fuck me,” he breathes, tilting his hips up against Steve’s as they move together on the bed. 

“No,” Steve smiles. “Not yet. I want us to be sober the first time I fuck you.”

“ _You’re_ sober,” Bucky argues. “Good enough, right?”

“No, Buck,” Steve chuckles affectionately, before reaching into Bucky’s boxers and jerking him off nice and slow. “For now, this is all you get.”

Bucky’s vision whites out when he comes, and he vaguely thinks he can hear his own voice crying out Steve’s name, vaguely thinks he can hear Steve’s voice shushing him and telling him how beautiful he is and then Bucky’s kissing him. He tries for deep and sensual, unsure if the kiss is coming across that way, but he’s quickly drifting into unconsciousness; the tequila and explosive orgasm finally catching up to him.

Steve is there, his arms encircling Bucky, and with his last conscious thought Bucky flips them so he is holding Steve, his face buried in blond hair and his arm flung over a muscular torso.

“So perfect, Stevie,” he hears himself murmur, and then all he knows is oblivion.


End file.
